Switch devices are used for various purposes, as contactors circuit breakers, relays and the like, and representative types are disclosed in the Sargent U.S. Pat. No. 789,457, The Ansingh U.S. Pat. No. 1,623,954, the Pandapas U.S. Pat. No. 2,866,046, the Burch U.S. Pat. No. 2,924,685, the Skay U.S. Pat. No. 3,054,871, the McFarland U.S. Pat. No. 3,619,533, the Vrola, et al. U.S. Pat. No. 3,703,621 and the Eberhard, et al. U.S. Pat. No. 3,848,101. In such switch devices, problems are oftentimes encountered in connection with a bouncing action produced when one contact is moved into an impact engagement with another, such an action being due in part to the resiliency of the contacts or the resiliency of the contact support. In many cases, a relative tilting action occurs when contact surfaces are brought together and the resiliency of the contacts or the contact supports have contributed to the relative tilting action which reduces areas of interengagement and produces high concentration of currents in small areas. High current concentrations are also a problem when one or both of a pair of engaging contact surfaces are rounded or pointed. There is in addition a problem in connection with contacts being blown apart when there are high surge currents, the problem being due to the fact that very high repulsion forces are developed by the magnetic fields produced from currents flowing in closely spaced parallel relation in two engaging contact members.
There have been attempts to solve contact bounce and other problems. For example, the Huber U.S. Pat. No. 2,421,267 shows a switch using springs with different natural periods of vibration and damping means as disclosed in the Bergstraesser U.S. Pat. No. 3,129,131 and Ramrath U.S. Pat. No. 2,891,134. In addition, there have been special purpose instructions such as disclosed in the Weston U.S. Pat. No. 3,617,671 and the Karl U.S. Pat. No. 2,853,627. The Karl Patent discloses an automotive safety switch having conical contacts.
Such disclosures do not solve the basic causes of problems and, as a result, prior art devices have been relatively heavy in construction, using large contacts and using actuating mechanisms capable of applying large forces to obtain acceptable current handling capability, to avoid contact bounce and to allow handling of surge currents.